Beauty and the Bodyguard

by Merline Lovelace

  The half smile hooked him, but a different emotion altogether reeled him in a few moments later.

  Erica’s huge square-cut emerald flashed as she reached for her daughter’s hand. “But that disgusting person said he’d find a way to come to you, and prove how much he loved you.”

  He’d said a lot more than that, Rafe guessed instantly, or Allie wouldn’t look away to hide the flicker of emotion that darkened her eyes. Rafe had been in the business long enough to recognize fear, no matter how well or how quickly hidden.

  Dammit, he thought in disgust, why couldn’t she have remained just a beautiful face? Why did he have to catch a glimpse of a vulnerable, frightened woman behind that sophisticated facade? Allison Fortune he would have walked away from without a qualm. The woman who refused to let her family see her fear tugged at his professional instincts. He couldn’t help wondering what else she was hiding behind that glamorous front.

  Okay, he rationalized, he could do this. He’d trained himself not to become emotionally involved with his clients. He could spend two weeks with Allison Fortune, shield her from this kook who got off by whispering obscenities over the phone, and pocket the outrageous fee her father offered. Assuming, of course, the lady agreed to protection…and to playing this particular game by his rules.

  “Please, darling,” Erica pleaded, her voice breaking a little. “It’s bad enough we didn’t even know about this disgusting pervert until the police called here, asking to speak to you. Don’t make it worse by refusing our protection until they track him down.”

  With a small sigh, Allie patted her mother’s hand. “I’m sorry. I should have told you about the calls. I just didn’t want to worry you. Or the rest of the family,” she added after a slight pause. “You’ve all had enough problems since Kate died.”

  “Then you’ll agree to additional security?” Jake asked.

  She slanted her father a cool glance, then turned those incredible eyes on Rafe. Strange, he’d never realized how changeable a color brown was before. In the space of a heartbeat, it could vary from deep, rich mocha to a flat, uninviting mud.

  “I agree,” she said after a moment. “But with certain conditions.”

  “I don’t operate with restrictions.”

  “And I can’t operate without a certain regimen,” she returned. “I run every morning, and during a shoot I have to get at least eight hours of sleep a night. All I’m asking is that you structure your security procedures around my schedule, if possible.”

  Rafe hadn’t seen the inside of a gym in years, and he’d never been much for jogging, but he figured he could keep his client covered during her morning jaunts. As for those eight hours a night in bed…

  With some effort, he banished the combustible image of Allie Fortune all doe-eyed and sleep-soft. Telling himself he was ten kinds of a fool, Rafe agreed. Reluctantly.

  “I think we can accommodate your schedule.”

  She hesitated, obviously as unenthusiastic as he was about the next two weeks. “Then I’ll leave you to negotiate the terms of your contract with my father. If you decide to accept the job, I’ll meet you at the airport. We have a ten-o’clock flight to Santa Fe.”

  “Well, I’m glad that’s settled,” Erica said with a sigh of relief as her daughter brushed a kiss across her cheek and started for the door.

  “Not quite,” Rafe drawled.

  Allie paused with one hand on the doorknob.

  “If I’m going to be responsible for your safety, Miss Fortune, I have a couple of conditions of my own.”

  “Such as?”

  “Such as no more strolls down to the lake—or anywhere else—unless I go along as a chaperon.”

  After so many years in front of the camera, hiding her thoughts had become almost second nature to Allie. Her job was to project the emotions the photographer and art director wanted, not her own feelings. So she kept her expression carefully neutral while she debated whether to tell Rafe Stone to take a flying leap in the lake—or anywhere else.

  As much as she wanted to put this man in his place, however, Allie had to admit the idea of a bodyguard had some merit. Although she routinely exercised basic security precautions against the weirdos who regularly fell in love with faces in magazines, these late-night calls had become too personal, too disturbing. She didn’t want this crazy to continue disrupting her life. Even more to the point, she didn’t want him to disrupt this shoot. Her older sister, her parents, her entire family, had staked everything on this campaign. Their tightly planned schedule allowed for minimal slippage.

  Despite his brusque manner, or perhaps because of it, this Rafe Stone had routed Dean Hansen easily enough. He certainly looked as though he could take care of one obnoxious, if obsessive, fan. Besides, she’d only need his protection for two weeks. Three at most. Just while they were on location. The police had assured her the security at her New York condo was adequate. She could dispense with his services when they returned to the city for the final studio work.

  Two weeks. She could put up with Rafe Stone’s constant presence for two weeks and still maintain the inner equilibrium.

  Maybe.

  “What’s your second condition?” she asked.

  “If I perceive a threat to your safety, you follow my orders. All of them. Immediately. Without question.”

  Allie wasn’t stupid. Nor was she foolhardy. In the event of a real threat, she’d be more than happy to let this man handle it.

  “Agreed.”

  Her acquiescence didn’t appear to afford him a great deal of pleasure. “I’ll pick you up at nine and take you to the airport,” he said brusquely.

  “No further negotiations with my father, Mr. Stone?”

  “No. And the name’s Rafe.”

  She hesitated, then extended her hand. “I go by Allie.”

  Her touch was warm and smooth and altogether too electric. Rafe curled his fingers around hers for the required few seconds. When she slid her hand out of his, her heat tingled against his palm, and he felt the damnedest urge to make a fist and trap it.

  Two weeks, he told himself grimly. He’d spent almost that long on his belly in the dust, staking out a supposed terrorist hideout in southern Spain. If he could handle that band of inept would-be revolutionaries, he could handle himself around Allie Fortune.

  Maybe.

  By eight-thirty the next morning, Allie was having second, third and fourth thoughts. She’d spent a restless night, trying without notable success to adjust to the idea of Rafe Stone’s disturbing presence in her life. Her sleeplessness hadn’t been helped by her sister’s acid observation that she’d let Jake do it to her—again.

  “Why didn’t you stand up to him?” Rocky asked, picking up the refrain she’d left off last night only when Allie threatened to tie a pillowcase over her head. Perched comfortably on a window seat in the bedroom the girls had shared since childhood, Rocky went after her twin with the piranha-like ruthlessness of a loving sister.

  “You should have told Jake to stuff it when he pressed you to do this campaign. You know how burnt out you are. You’ve been trying to stuff acting lessons in between your runway shows and advertising shoots. You only have time for an occasional date with jerks like Hansen. And now you’ve got this creep calling you in the middle of the night. What you need, sister mine, is a hot and fast and furious affair.”

  “Right.”

  “I’m serious. You need someone to make you kick back and enjoy life again. Preferably a man who doesn’t worship at the altar of your beauty.”

  “What I need is for you to get off my back,” Allie retorted, tossing a nightshirt into her weekender.

  “Me, or Jake?”

  “Both of you.”

  “So tell him!”

  “I’m not you, Rocky. I don’t make an art form out of challenging people.”

  “Bull-loney! Don’t pull that innocent act on me. You never hesitated to challenge anyone when we were younger. You just did it so sweetly, no one but Kate
ever saw through your angelic facade. It’s just since her death that you’ve let Jake and Caroline and the whole family take over your life.”

  Allie gripped her zippered makeup bag in both hands as a now familiar pain lanced through her. Involuntarily her gaze drifted to the battered tin carousel sitting on the dresser.

  Kate had seen her granddaughters’ wide-eyed fascination when she’d first acquired the carousel. Laughing, she’d given the German-made toy to the girls to play with, even though it was an expensive antique. As Kate was so fond of saying, there was nothing more precious in the world than a child’s joy. The tomboyish Rocky had soon tired of the little merry-go-round, but Allie had delighted in its filigreed canopy and prancing horses throughout her childhood. Now dented and dinged from years of use, the tin carousel was Allie’s most cherished reminder of her grandmother. Kate had left it to her in her will as a personal keepsake.

  Dropping the makeup bag, Allie walked over to the dresser. Unerringly, her fingers wound the key just the right number of times. Too many, and the melody tripped and hurried, like a twittering sparrow chasing another bird away from its nest. Too few, and it slowed to a sluggish crawl.

  She released the key, and a Chopin polonaise tinkled through the air. One after another, the miniature horses dipped and rose, pawing the air in time to the music.

  As the music wound down, Rocky sighed. “God, I miss her.”

  Allie swallowed to ease her aching throat. “Me too.”

  Pulling her nightshirt out of the suitcase, she wrapped it carefully around the little carousel, then tucked the bundle in amid her underwear.

  “That’s why I didn’t tell Jake to stuff it,” Allie told her sister slowly. “And why I’m going to New Mexico. Kate spent her life building Fortune Cosmetics. If I can help keep it from falling apart, I will.”

  “All right,” Rocky conceded, rising. “Have it your way. But I wish you’d let me fly you to Santa Fe. I’d feel better about the whole situation if I had a chance to shake out this goon Jake’s hired and see what he’s made of.”

  Allie shuddered. “The idea of you shaking us out is exactly why I don’t want you to fly us to New Mexico. The last time you took me up in one of Kate’s planes, I lost the contents of my purse, my camera bag and my stomach. At least a commercial charter doesn’t do wheelies.”

  A pained expression crossed Rocky’s face. “Bicycles do wheelies, Allison. Skateboards do wheelies. Twin-engine Piper Comanches do three-point reverse spins, of which that was a perfect example.”

  “Whatever it was, I’m not anxious to repeat the experience.” Allie zipped her weekender shut, then glanced at the bedside clock. “If you want to check Rafe out, you can come downstairs. He’s picking me up in ten minutes.”

  “Rafe?”

  “The goon,” Allie replied dryly.

  A speculative gleam entered Rocky’s eyes. “Hmm… Maybe this bodyguard business isn’t such a bad idea after all. Two weeks. Just you and him.”

  “And a crew of forty or so.”

  Rocky dismissed the crew with a wave of one hand. “Whatever. I definitely have to check the guy out.”

  “Come on, then. He should be here any moment, and I don’t want to keep him waiting.”

  Her twin sketched her a salute. “Yes, ma’am! Right away, ma’am!”

  Thirty minutes later, Allie’s leather sole was tapping the polished vestibule floor. Rocky had temporarily deserted her, gone to the kitchen in search of a cup of coffee. She had only her growing irritation for company while she waited for her bodyguard.

  Pushing back the sleeve of her pink gabardine tunic, Allie flicked another glance at her watch. Normally, she handled delays with more patience. They were inevitable in her profession. Photographers always seemed to need a different lens. Props mysteriously disappeared just when they were needed. But Rafe’s tardiness only added to her burgeoning doubts about their tentative arrangement. So much for his promises to accommodate himself to her schedule.

  When the chimes sounded a few moments later, she opened the door, wincing a bit as splashes of fire-hydrant red, carroty orange and violent purple filled her vision. Last night, Rafe’s tie had intrigued her. In the bright light of day, it assaulted her senses.

  “Good morning,” she offered in a clipped tone, reaching for her bag. “We’d better hurry. We’re late. The others will be waiting.”

  Rafe’s jaw tightened imperceptibly. After three years, he should be used to the reaction his appearance caused. But Allie’s involuntary flinch and curt greeting came on top of a near-sleepless night and several long hours on the phone this morning, nailing down the status of the investigation into her calls. Rafe didn’t like being late, any more than he liked the information he’d finally pulled out of the New York Police Department. Consequently, his greeting was as terse as hers.

  “They’ll have to wait a little longer. You need to change. You’re too conspicuous.”

  Surprised, she glanced down at her outfit.

  Rafe didn’t have any problem with her black slacks, but the hot-pink tunic with the black braid looped under one arm and the military trim in glittering jet would catch any man’s eye, especially with Allie wearing it.

  “I’ll share one of the tips of the trade with you,” he told her. “Unless you’re baiting a trap, you do your best to disguise the prey.”

  Rafe could see that she didn’t particularly like hearing herself described as prey. But after listening to the transcription she’d given the police of her late-night calls, he couldn’t describe her as anything else.

  “For the next few weeks, at least,” he continued, “you need to remain as inconspicuous as possible.”

  Thick, shining hair brushed her shoulder as she tilted her head, studying his face. Rafe braced himself as her gaze drifted to his neck.

  “It might be easier for me to remain inconspicuous if my bodyguard didn’t wear red and orange fish-eyes,” she suggested.

  Rafe fingered his tie, wondering for a moment if he’d misread Allie’s reaction when she opened the door. He’d barely restrained a wince himself when he first saw the item in question. But it had been a gift from the five-year-old he’d rescued from an enclave of vicious, heavily armed white supremacists. The girl had been kidnapped by her father, who didn’t believe that the courts or his ex-wife held any authority over him. Jody had picked out the tie herself, she’d told Rafe solemnly. He’d worn it then to please her, but the thing had since become a sort of personal talisman. In this instance, at least, it served a useful purpose.

  “I’d rather people’s eyes were drawn to me than to you,” he told his client. “The tie helps, almost as much as the scars.”

  Her eyes widened slightly at his reference to his disfigurement. Rafe had learned that most people preferred to tiptoe around the subject, if they mentioned it at all. He’d never learned to tiptoe.

  “You can do your part by dressing a little less like a…” He raked her with a quick glance. “Like a supermodel.”

  Rafe half expected a pout or a protest. In his admittedly limited experience, the last thing a beautiful woman wanted was to downplay her attractions. To his surprise, she curbed her obvious impatience at the delay and motioned him inside.

  “I didn’t bring much with me from New York, but I can borrow some jeans or something from Rocky.”

  Rafe turned the name over in his mind as he stepped inside. Rocky. Rachel Fortune. Allison’s twin sister.

  “Do you want a cup of coffee or something while I change?”

  “No thanks.”

  “I’ll just be a moment.”

  Shoving his hands in his pockets, Rafe leaned a shoulder against the wall and made a leisurely inspection of the entry hall and the huge living room beyond. Last night, the house had overflowed with noise and people. Rafe had noted its elegance, but absorbed little of its character.

  This morning, sunlight streamed through the fan-shaped window above the door and warmed the oak flooring to a golden glow. F
resh flowers added bright spots of color to the greens and blues of the high-backed chairs and overstuffed sofas grouped around the living room. For all its vastness, the Fortune mansion gave the impression of a home.

  Rafe certainly couldn’t have said the same for the apartment he’d moved into in Miami after his divorce. Although it was furnished with all the basics, it lacked some indefinable homelike quality. Maybe that was due to the fact that he spent only a few days a month there, if that. For a moment, Rafe toyed with the idea of coming home to a place imbued with beauty and quiet elegance…and to a woman with the same qualities. A woman like Allie.

  He shook his head at the errant thought. He’d been down that road once. He wasn’t about to travel it again. The sound of footsteps echoing against the oak floor banished his unpleasant memories, and Rafe straightened as Allie walked into view.

  His first thought was that he’d done some stupid things in his life. Having his client exchange her loose slacks for well-washed denims that hugged her hips and showed off the tight curve of her bottom ranked right up there among the dumbest. Every male past puberty would trip over his tongue when she walked by.

  His second was that she’d changed more than her clothes. At first, Rafe couldn’t pinpoint exactly what. Her sorrel hair swept her shoulders in the same thick wave. Sooty lashes framed the same chocolate-brown eyes. Her full mouth looked as tempting as it had when she opened the door to him a few moments ago. But something about the way she held herself triggered an instinctive, gut-level question in Rafe’s mind.

  It took a few seconds before he realized that the woman returning his stare wasn’t Allie.

  Christ! The dossier had indicated that she and her sister were identical twins, but that brief annotation didn’t begin to describe their astounding similarity. If Rafe hadn’t spent half the night imprinting his client’s features and mannerisms on his mind, he might never have known this wasn’t her.

  Their differences, he decided objectively, were more a matter of style than of appearance. Unlike Allison’s classic sophistication, Rachel opted for a more rugged look. She wore a brown leather aviator jacket with the sleeves pushed up, a white knit top, boots, and the jeans that had made Rafe’s heart skip a few beats. He could only hope they wouldn’t hug Allie’s slender figure as faithfully as they did her sister’s.